IPACK-IMA, the international trade fair specialising in packaging, processing and innovative materials, scheduled to take place at Fiera Milano Rho from 27 to 30 May 2025, is launching a new collaboration that aims to strengthen dialogue with the pasta market with an unmissable event for the sector: the Pastaria Festival.
Promoted by Pastaria, the international magazine of reference for pasta producers, the festival is scheduled with an extraordinary edition inside the IPACK-IMA spaces on May 28th and 29th, 2025. An event within the event, with the aim of offering pasta producers a unique opportunity to get up-to-date, meet experts and discover the latest innovations.
"The market revolving around pasta and grain-based food is part of a very broad supply chain that ranges from food processing to bakery, from packaging machinery to end-of-line, without forgetting automation, robotics, traceability, labelling and innovative materials, which are strategic for a mass-consumption product like pasta," says CEO Simone Castelli. With an event of the magnitude of Pastaria, IPACK-IMA aims to open an even closer and more profitable dialogue with a sector that has always been a key player at the show, with the prospect of becoming even more so".
"The Pastaria Festival was created with the aim of offering pasta producers a unique opportunity for updating and comparison: this year it will do so in an international context of excellence like IPACK-IMA," announces Lorenzo Pini, director and publisher of Pastaria. The pasta industry is evolving rapidly, and our goal is to create a moment of qualified exchange where technology, market and know-how meet to offer new prospects for development. We are thrilled to bring the Pastaria Festival inside IPACK-IMA 2025, a collaboration that reinforces our commitment to giving voice and value to a strategic sector, connecting all the players in the supply chain".
Now in its ninth edition, the festival represents the main international appointment for the pasta industry, with a programme of high-level conferences and meetings, offered in Italian and English with simultaneous translation and enriched by the contribution of universities, companies and sector specialists. The topics range from technological innovation to sustainability, from food safety to global market dynamics, offering concrete tools to face the challenges of the future.
An opportunity full of synergies
Being an integral part of IPACK-IMA, the festival will not only allow visitors to attend a rich programme of conferences, but also to explore the latest technological innovations presented by the show's exhibitors and come into direct contact with suppliers of pasta production and packaging solutions, creating new business synergies. Participation in Pastaria Festival 2025 is free of charge and reserved for pasta producers. The detailed programme of the event will soon be available at www.pastaria.it
A sector grinding successes in production, consumption and technology
In 2024, the global pasta market reached 130 billion euro with an expected annual growth rate of +6.6% by 2028. This growth is attributed to urbanisation, changing lifestyles and the global spread of cuisines that make extensive use of pasta products such as Asian and Italian cuisines, driving ever more widespread consumption. On average, 17 million tonnes of pasta are produced and consumed every year. Leading the sector in terms of production is Italy, with almost 4 million tonnes of pasta produced per year, a turnover of over 8 billion euros and exports accounting for 47% of total production. It is followed by the United States (2 million tonnes produced), Turkey (almost 2 million), Egypt (1.2 million) and Brazil (almost 1.2 million).
Some of the qualities of pasta, such as shelf life, prolonged shelf life, ease of transport, contribute to its commercial success, also favouring the machinery sector for this niche market. The latest surveys on the Italian Bakery & Grain Based Food packaging technology sector record a value of 579 million euros per year, with 72% for exports. Widening the horizon of observation to the packaging technologies of the Food sector, the latest analysis forecasts that the sector will grow in Italy with expectations of +4.4% by 2028 (source: PACK-IMA Observatory on MECS data).
Daniele Toni